RNC Recap - Republicans Apocalyptic Warnings Fall Flat, but Tim Scott Shines
Photo Credit: Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)
By: Logan Phillips
Date: August 25th
The weekend before the convention, President Trump assured reporters that Republicans were going to be delivering a much more uplifting message than the Democratic party. Clearly, somebody forgot to inform the Convention speakers on Monday night. Their central message was a dire warning of the horror awaiting America if Joe Biden becomes President. They painted a picture so dark, so apocalyptic that the convention came across more like a satire of itself than a political party platform. Beware the evils of the Democratic party… for they are the great thought police, menaces determined to control free-speech, and primed to viscously attack anyone that disagrees with them.
If you came from another planet and this was your first day in the United States, you would be forgiven for concluding that we are all in great peril. Speaker after speaker gave haunting diatribes about their fellow Americans on the other side of the political aisle, warning that Biden would transform America into a Marxist and Fascist state. The only problem? The picture they painted was totally untethered to reality. It makes one wonder if half of these commentators have even spoken to a Democrat in the last decade.
In fact, many of the most vigorous arguments made Monday night were against policies Joe Biden has never even supported. RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel decried Biden for wanting to raise taxes on 83% of Americans – but he has made it clear that taxes will only increase for people earning over $400k a year. Speakers repeatedly chastised Joe Biden for wanting to abolish the police – a policy he has explicitly opposed. Joe Biden supports other reforms, like permanently removing Police Officers that use excessive force or discriminate against Americans. One speaker even claimed that Joe Biden would abolish the suburbs - a self-evidently ridiculous claim.
High Points
1. Tim Scott: To be clear, there were a few key exceptions, and by far the most riveting was South Carolina Senator Tim Scott, who was the last speaker of the night. Conventions have often played a double role as showcases of talent for future Presidential candidates, and Scott might just have put himself on the shortlist for 2024.
The only African American Republican in the Senate, Senator Scott has already distinguished himself as one of the rare high-profile members of his party willing to be blunt and open about America’s very real issues with racism. In an era of hyper partisanship, many Americans are unwilling to hear voices from the other side of the aisle. Scott’s comments on the systemic discrimination African Americans face has opened the eyes of more than a few conservatives that I have spoken with in the past.
Last night, instead of torching his opponents or waxing poetically about Trump’s greatness, Senator Scott put forth a much more compelling and optimistic vision of America and emphasized a forward-looking agenda. Emulating a tactic employed by many of the great convention speakers in the past few decades, Scott sought to tie his story to the greater American story. “My grandfather’s 99th birthday would have been tomorrow,” he said. “Growing up he had to cross a street if a white person was coming. He suffered the indignity of being forced out of school as a third grader to pick cotton and he never learned to read or write. Yet, he lived long enough to see his grandson be the first African American elected to both the House of Representatives and the United States Senate in the history of this country.”
“Our family went from cotton to congress in one lifetime. That is why I believe the next American century can be better than the last. There are millions of families just like mine full of potential seeking to live the American dream.”
2. Andrew Pollack: Pollack lost his teenage daughter Meadow in the horrific Parkland Shooting tragedy and argued forcefully for alternatives to gun control to reduce shootings in America. His deep love for his daughter was moving, and it was haunting to hear him recount the moments he would never get to share with her - from dropping her off at college for the first time, to walking her down the aisle.
I disagree with Andrew Pollack’s conclusions. After Newtown, my home state of Connecticut adopted reasonable gun control reform – and the results speak for themselves. Death from gun violence dropped sharply to the lowest in state history - and that was even with gun sales continuing to increase. However, I will forever admire the braveness and tenacity of people like Pollack, that have been on the receiving end of heart wrenching trauma, but somehow find the strength to get back up, and make their voice heard, fighting for what they believe in. I will not soon forget what he had to say.
Low Points
1. Coronavirus Video: On the other side of the spectrum, the single most tone death moment of the year must be awarded to a video celebrating Donald Trump’s great triumph over the Coronavirus. In this retelling of events, the Democrats refused to acknowledge the threat of the Coronavirus, but Trump bravely and boldly recognized the true gravity of the moment and acted immediately to save millions of lives. While there are many Mayors, Governors, and politicians that did not prepare the way they should have, Trump surely was not the exception. Does anyone seriously believe this is the defining achievement of his presidency? If Trump were President during World War 2, he would be bragging that Pearl Harbor was the greatest military victory in history.
2. McCloskey Couple: If Tim Scott offers a glimpse of hope for a better future for the Republican party, the McCloskey couple from St. Louis is a clear reminder of the darkest tendencies of their present.
They became famous after Black Lives Matters protestors took a shortcut through the McCloskey’s private road on their way to a rally. Perhaps they had a right to be annoyed, but their response was completely unacceptable and beyond unhinged. They both charged out of their house with guns in hand and aimed their firearms directly at unarmed Black Lives Matter protesters. The moment was particularly palpable considering the murder of unarmed black men and women was exactly what spurred millions of Americans to protest in the first place, and now these folks had to worry if they were going to be the next name on everyone's lips just because they took a shortcut.
Why were they put on the stage? Perhaps because it makes Democrats mad. What political benefit that gives Trump I do not know - but I feel confident it did not play well with the 62% of suburban voters that support Black Lives Matters, a group that abandoned the GOP in droves in 2018, and who currently support Biden by wide margins. It was political malpractice to have them on the stage – and more importantly it was flat out wrong. They were one or two more bad decisions away from being murderers that night and they are the very last people that should ever be hailed as heroes.
They were there to do one thing, and one thing alone: Scare people. They painted a dark and wildly inaccurate picture of Black Lives Matter as a communist group bent on tearing apart the country – and Joe Biden as a President primed to bring violence to the streets and destruction to every peaceful community in America. It was clearly a racially loaded argument. Who could have ever predicted that two unhinged people that aimed loaded guns at black protestors would also paint a racist dystopian image of America?
3. Kimberly Guilfoyle: The one speech Democrats hope goes viral from tonight is probably former Fox News Host and Donald Jr.’s Girlfriend Kimberly Guilfoyle. It was… bizarre, breathtakingly conspiratorial, and very, very loud. Warning of the great blue threat, she shouted “They want to enslave you to the weak dependent liberal victim! They want to destroy this country and everything that we have fought for and hold dear! They want to steal your liberty and your freedom.”
It’s more than a bit silly to paint Joe Biden as the crown prince of cancel culture given how little he has ever embraced the tactic. Realistically, cancel culture is here to stay no matter who wins. Whether they be righteous or ridiculous, boycotts can't be banned in liberal democracy and capitalist economy, because you cannot force people to purchase something they don’t want to buy, and you can’t stop people from organizing and making their voice heard.
It’s ironic that this argument is becoming a rallying cry for Trump’s re-election, given that Donald Trump might be the single most energetic embracer of cancel culture in Washington D.C. Perhaps you have heard of Trump’s efforts to boycott Macy’s, the NFL, or Goodyear Tires just this past week, but those are just the type of the iceberg. It’s a long list that includes the whiskey Glenfiddich (They named “total loser Michael Forbes”, as Scott of the Year), “dopey Karl Rove”, (he didn’t praise Trump’s Nevada primary victory), and the WSJ Editorial Board (“Seldom has a paper been so wrong!” ).
